Tristan Tzara and DADAISM

Tristan Tzara (1896-1963) He is considered the founder of Dadaism along with Hugo Ball (1886-1927) and Hans Arp (1886-1966). At unPROFESOR.com we tell you the Tristan Tzara's relationship with Dadaism.

Tristan Tzara was a poet, writer and critical thinker of the first half of the 20th century. Tzara rebelled against the values ​​and ideals established by the society of his time. Some conventions from which Tzara believed it was necessary to free himself, especially with regard to intellect and creativity. Dadaism was that liberation.

In this lesson from unPROFESOR.com we summarize what was the Tristan Tzara's contribution to Dadaism.

Index

1. Who was Tristan Tzara, one of the fathers of Dadaism
2. Who wrote the Dadaist manifesto?
3. Contributions of Tristan Tzara in Dadaism
4. What does Dada mean and what are the basic characteristics of Dadaism?

Tristan Tzara was a Romanian intellectual of Jewish origin

In 1916 he was one of the founders of the dadaist movement in Switzerland, being a movement in line with its idiosyncrasy: rebellious, critical of social and cultural conventions and with a penchant for the absurd.

Tzara's death was also controversial, with different versions existing about his circumstances. According to some sources, Tzara would have been poisoned by one of his lovers as a result of an attack of jealousy. A story that, although it has no evidence, does agree with the character of absurdity.

In addition to being one of the main founders of the Dada movement, Tzara was the author of the first Dada manifesto in 1918. The Dada manifesto is made up of a set of seven works and is known as The Seven Dada Manifestos.

In 1916, in the streets and cafes of Zurich it was possible to meet a notable number of political refugees, objectors who They were fleeing the world war, secret agents in the service of different countries, as well as artists, poets and writers exiles. A large group among which was Tristan Tzara.

Tzara and his friends were at the Cabaret Voltaire, at number 1, rue de la Spielgasse. In this mythical cafe Tzara met with Jean Arp, Marcel Duchamp, Kurt Schwitters and other artists to play chess with Lenin, who lived in front of the premises, and start a rebellion spiritual attack against the society that had ended up starting and allowing such a bloody and global.

The radicality of the movement and its subversive character It constitutes one of the main characteristics of Dadaism. A spiritual and intellectual movement that sought to renew art and literature from a radical position.

The 7 Dada manifestos written by Tzara In 1918 they collected all the assumptions of the movement and turned the writer and thinker into a source of inspiration for everyone. those artists and writers who wish to break the limits established by traditional culture and create a new language artistic.

He questioning reality, creative freedom and spontaneity They were the tools presented by Tzara as a way to achieve personal freedom and social freedom. Thus, his style was always anarchic, provocative, irreverent and disruptive.

In his manifestos, Tzara called to create works that challenge traditional standards of beauty and coherence. His experimental and absurd style included word games, dissociated fragments, as well as visual resources such as photomontages and collages.

In the case of art, Dada artists resorted to the use of everyday objects in their creations, using the technique of ready-made. A technique that consists of giving common objects a completely different use than usual, placing them in a new context and giving them an artistic value that they lacked.

Dadaism did not last long, but it did become the germ of the artistic avant-garde of the 20th century, especially movements such as surrealism and conceptual art.

The word Dadaist it has no meaning, without defining itself as a movement with a unified style by obeying a criticism of the traditional sense of art and wanting to get away from any classification, school or style.

Thus, the Dadaists only remained united around a set of common principles, especially the desire to place themselves outside the traditional sense of art and subvert what was established. Between the characteristics of dadaism we can stand out:

• Dadaism had a interdisciplinary nature and it manifested itself both in literature and in the plastic arts.
• The search for the beautiful and kind to please the viewer disappears when considering that the horror of war makes it impossible to believe in the existence of the traditional concept of beauty.
• Dada is anti-art and it is more a way of acting on reality than a specific type of literary or pictorial language.
• Silk more value to the artistic gesture than to the creation or the artistic object. The subjectivity of the artist is what is considered “artistic”, and it is possible for any object to acquire the value of a work of art.
• Biting mockery is used, especially against the capitalist bourgeoisie and Bueguese artists and as a way of being provocative and irreverent.
• Along the same lines, Dadaism is a fierce criticism against society Western and its clichés.
• It claims the irrationality and positivism is rejected.
• Are crated new techniques artistic like readymade, photomontage and collage.
• The word is used in an innovative way, random, irrational and playing with letters and sounds. Calligram is one of the techniques used by the Dadaists.

If you want to read more articles similar to Tristan Tzara and Dadaism: summary, we recommend that you enter our category of History.

• LÓPEZ LUPIÁÑEZ, Núria. The thought of Tristan Tzara in the Dadaist period. University of Barcelona, ​​2002.
• LUPIÁÑEZ, Núria López. Tristan Tzara and the “dictatorship of the spirit”: destruction and affirmation.
• TORÉS GARCÍA, Alberto. Tristan Tzara, "The Approximate Man." Sur: Literature Magazine, 2015, no 5, p. 16.
• TZARA, Tristan; PICABIA, Francis; HALTTER, Huberto. Seven Dada Manifestos. (No Title), 1972.